


The King's Hand

by Eloyns



Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Angst, Dark, Dark Sans, F/M, King!Papyrus AU, Post-Neutral Route (Undertale), Reader Is Not Frisk
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-01-03
Updated: 2016-01-03
Packaged: 2018-05-11 11:43:25
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,806
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5625415
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Eloyns/pseuds/Eloyns
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Their hope of getting to the surface had been ripped away overnight. During the span of a few short hours, a single human child had managed to remove the most important characters in their society. </p><p>By process of elimination, Papyrus became the new king. </p><p>The underground was filled with despair, and most of them hated humans more than ever. Sans continued doing what he did best; working in the shadows to maintain peace, and dirtying his hands in secret. When another human fell down into the underground, Sans needed to decide what to do with her. </p><p>King Papyrus AU</p>
            </blockquote>





	The King's Hand

Sans hadn’t really thought about what it would require from him if Papyrus ever became king. Truth be told, ha hadn’t even considered that a possibility. That was, until he had a murderous human child on his hands. The kid had for some reason decided to kill everyone except for Alphys and his brother. During such a short amount of time they had all disappeared.

Sighing deeply, Sans looked wistfully up at the giant skull-machine in front of him. Its existence was one of the many reminders of his past life. He was the one who was responsible for the lab now. It was funny how history repeated itself. There was no one left to do this work but him. Alphys had killed herself after losing everyone. He should have seen it coming, she had been depressed for years.

Truth be told, most monsters were kind of depressed down here, they had different ways of coping is all. Alphys wasn’t as aware of the different timelines as he was, but that didn’t mean she hadn’t been smart enough to realize something was off. He guessed that she hadn’t wanted to know the truth, her being partially responsible and all. Not as responsible as he was though. He should have told her that. 

Sans straightened himself and walked out of the room. With the blink of an eye his surrounding changed, and he found himself outside the great stone doors leading into the ruins. If he were to be totally honest, he would say that he blamed himself for not stopping the human. This was what happened when guys like him took it easy. Although he was grateful that the kid had spared Papyrus, it was hard losing the others.

The human’s show of mercy had made him believe there must be something good left inside them. It had been enough for him to decide to keep his promise, to watch over them. It was only later he realized that the voice behind the door had disappeared as well.

He had known since the beginning that the voice belonged to queen Toriel. Even though few were aware of the fact, Sans had been working directly beneath the king for years, ever since the time-travel incident. He and Asgore went way back. It may be hard to believe, but he was actually very good at his job. He had been honest with the kid, when he had said that they would be dead where they stood if it wasn’t for his promise.. 

Knowing the old goat as well as he did, he had not been surprised when Asgore had asked him to search for his lost wife. It hadn’t taken him long to track her down. He usually didn’t have a problem finding people if he really wanted to. However, Sans hadn’t expected to get a great friend out of the whole ordeal. 

A shudder ran through him as he looked up at the familiar doors. The grin he wore in front of everyone slipped as he remembered the hours of laughing and talking. Those had been some of his best moments down here. Finding her ash had actually made him feel agony, a change from the constant state of numbness that followed him wherever he went. Thank god he still had Papyrus, he didn’t know what he would do if he lost him as well. 

A flash of blue appeared in his eye at the thought, and he used the small magic burst to force the doors open. He was in the same position he always was, directly beneath the king, and set on doing his job. The only difference was that the king was now his brother. Papyrus did his best to keep everyone’s morals high. That’s why he had been elected leader in the first place. It was a risk to Papyrus’ safety, but Sans had to agree that it was the only option. 

People were devastated after losing their king. They had also lost their hero, their scientist, as well as their only source of entertainment. Not to mention the human souls. Their only hope of getting to the surface had been wiped away in an instant. At least until another human fell down, or the timeline reset.

Sans was secretly hoping for the latter; he would love nothing more than to get a new shot at making things right. Maybe if he remembered this, he would have the opportunity to kill the kid as soon as they set their feet outside the ruins. He wasn’t especially keen on killing humans anymore, that got old kinda fast. Just removing their souls became pretty repetitive after doing it six times. Unless he let himself become all sadistic, there was simply no fun in killing them quickly. 

Up until this point, he hadn’t had a reason to want to punish them. He would lie if he said he wasn’t slightly bitter at this point though. Maybe catching a human now could prove to be more entertaining than the other times. 

The resets had used to make everything meaningless for him, but sometimes he couldn’t help asking himself if it would be better than what they had now. Then again, that didn’t mean that the next timeline would be any better than this one.

Papyrus had always breathed him for being lazy, even though that couldn’t be further from the truth. Sans was exhausted, he was bored, and he had the bothersome habit of falling asleep at odd moments. What else could you do when your every action ended up being meaningless. It didn’t matter in the end, nothing did. Not the people he hurt or killed, those actions might be reset anyway. He was just doing his damn job. 

He couldn’t hide his hard work from Papyrus now that he was king. His brother was no fool. He was innocent, perhaps too innocent to deal with the decisions that followed with being king, but he wasn’t stupid. He was optimistic, and right now he was the monsters role model. He was the icon the people needed in their time of despair.

There was no way his brother could do what he did. The work would have crushed him. So Sans had taken it upon himself to spare Papyrus from the darker parts of ruling a kingdom, and the darker truth about his friends disappearance. He would rather keep Papyrus' hands clean, even if it ment dirtying his own further. 

Asgore had been a coward. He had been too content with the status quo of staying beneath the surface. If he had had the guts, he could have taken the first human soul and gone through the portals to get the remaining souls they needed. He had been too soft, too full of mercy, too scared of the world outside. He would rather wait for unsuspecting humans to fall down into the underground and take their souls, even if it meant prolonging their people’s imprisonment.

Sans had offered to go through the portal to get the remaining souls, but Asgore wouldn’t have it. They had waited and waited, and with each fallen human, the result had still been the same. Sans was the king’s hand, and thus he had taken the task none the less. He had been the one to kill the humans who had fallen down through the portal. He had used his powers to rip their souls from their bodies, rather than take them to the king. He knew the task would have crushed old Fluffybuns, and he was actually kind of fond of the old goat.

The only reason he hadn’t killed the last child was because of Toriel. Asgore had respected his decision. No one had ever ordered Sans to kill the humans. Asgore wasn’t that big of a coward, but he hadn’t said anything against it when Sans had showed up with one soul after another. Was he proud of his actions up until this point? Hell no. Had they been necessary? Welp, he had thought so at the time. Too bad it had all been for nothing.

Sans had nothing against humans at the time, it had never been personal for him. He would rather have told them a few bad jokes, done some pranks on them and let them be on their way. He knew most of them had been innocent and afraid. He had usually made it quick, humans really were weak and fragile. But most importantly, he had made sure none of them ever met Papyrus. He couldn’t afford his brother getting attached to something that could never be.

That’s why he had yet to brief his brother about the human that had been spotted in the ruins. He didn’t know what to do about it at this point. Should he take the reins himself, and use the human's soul to go get six more on the surface? Would that be the best approach? Were the monsters ready to meet the humans at this point? Their hatred for humans was greater than it had ever been. Sans couldn’t risk another war breaking out when they finally reached the surface.

There just weren’t enough monsters to defeat the humans, not when a single child had managed to wipe out such a large part of their population. If they got out now, violence would undoubtedly ensue. He needed to get the human before one of the other monsters killed it. He would figure out later what he would do with it. Once inside the stone doors Sans took another shortcut, effectively appearing beside one of the pillars inside the ruins.

It didn’t take him long to spot the human. She was older than the last one who had been there, and noticeably female. She was pushing a button, trying to open the door to progress further. Too bad for her that it was the wrong switch. Sans chuckled lightly when a hole appeared beneath her. Her expression when she was swallowed by the ground was priceless. 

Their eyes met briefly as she fell, and a mixture of shock and curiosity crossed her face as she spotted him. Sans caught himself thinking that this might be entertaining after all. She seemed like a very expressive person, easy to read just by a quick glance. She didn’t have any dust on her as far as he could tell, and as of right now she simply seemed lost and scared.

It didn’t matter to him if she was innocent though. She was their ticket out, no matter which road he decided to take. It was hard enough keeping Papyrus safe if he didn’t have a human to worry about as well, but he didn’t exactly have a choice now did he? Welp, he might as well try to enjoy himself while working. 

**Author's Note:**

> For updates about the story, check out my [writing blog](http://eloynsins.tumblr.com/) (nsfw)


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